The SBC’s “Title IX” Recommendations on Handling Abuse
Written by Aaron M. Renn |
Tuesday, June 21, 2022
The recommendations in the report essentially represent a progressive takeover of the SBC, utilizing the same pattern of of Title IX style administrative control used by progressives in higher education (and elsewhere). As in secular society, accusations of wrongdoing are being leveraged for the purposes of seizing control of an institution.
In newsletter #49 I discussed the importance of defending institutional integrity. The first plank of this was “trusthworthiness,” that is, operating with baseline morals and ethics. As I put it, “You would think this would be a simple baseline element of institutional leadership, but alas apparently not. The number of churches and other Christian institutions with a variety of moral, ethical, operational, and even criminal problems is absurdly high.”
Unfortunately, one of the areas with severe failings has been in responding to abuse. The Catholic abuse scandals get the most press, but there’s a ton of Protestant ones too. At the same time, I pointed out that in the Protestant world, outrage over abuse is curiously selective and often associated with political attempts by activists to insert themselves as the leaders of the institution being accused. I said with regards to this:
This is why, although even accusations by enemies that are true need to be strongly addressed, you should never give any sort of position of authority or oversight of your organization to people making accusations against it. You’ll note that they frequently agitate for this such as by demanding that some allied organization be retained for an investigation, calling for the board members to be replaced (naturally by people of which they approve), etc. But just because I point out that an organization has some conflict of interest, for example, that doesn’t mean I or my buddies should be assigned any role in running or overseeing its finances.
I want to examine the recent Southern Baptist Convention abuse report through this lens. I didn’t go into any detail on the investigation itself and the findings. Sadly, I have no doubt that there are many cases of abuse, and many cases in which incidents of abuse were poorly handled.
The SBC is a huge denomination with nearly 14 million members. Clearly, any group this large will have lot of bad things happen within it. Demographer Lyman Stone suggested that the report shows the SBC has lower levels of abuse than we would expect. Even if that’s true, it certainly doesn’t excuse the evildoers or those who failed to correctly act in positions of authority. Judgment begins with the household of God. The Protestant house has not been in order on abuse.
Rather than the allegations themselves, I want to look at the report’s recommendations for action. There are about 30 pages worth of them, including 17 executive committee recommendations (along with two alternatives) and 16 credentials commmittee recommendations. So even in the recommendations, I cannot do a detailed analysis here. But I will give a big picture look.
Creating a Title IX Style Adjudication System in the SBC
Before getting into the recommendations, it’s important to note that in baptist church polity, each congregation is completely autonomous. Unlike other denominations like the Episcopal Church or the Presbyterian Church, where the denomination provides a lot of oversight and control over congregations, baptist denominations do not have authority over their churches. Basically, the only membership requirements are very low baselines, such as giving assent to the broadly evangelical Baptist Faith and Message statement. The SBC is more of a cooperative association than a denomination per se.
The abuse report recommendations start to change that in two key ways:
- It proposes creating an “administrative entity” that will be similar to a Title IX style tribunal in investigating allegations of abuse.
- It proposes turning the credentialing committee (which basically determines whether or not a church is affiliated with the SBC) into a more expansive accrediting committee that can kick out any churches that don’t comply with the Title IX style entity, or who are otherwise not perceived as following the party line from the report recommendations on abuse.
Given that this report is about some of the some heinous felonies on the books —sexual assault and sexual abuse —it’s remarkable how few references to the criminal or civil legal system there are in the recommendations. Apart from references to mandated reporting —cases where churches are legally obligated to report suspected abuse to the police —I only saw one reference to criminal justice in the recommendations, a note that the Title IX style entity might hire people from law enforcement backgrounds.
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Greg Abbott, Alistair Begg, and the Law of Fashion
Written by Ben C. Dunson |
Thursday, February 15, 2024
It is bad enough when anyone gives in to the sinister pressures of culture, but it is significantly worse when people in positions of prominence (like Begg) do so. It makes it all the harder for non-prominent Christians to stand firm, because strident advocates of immorality and unbelief will point to such capitulations as evidence that the biblical position isn’t so clear after all. This is already occurring with regard to Begg’s comments. While Christians cannot single-handedly, and instantly, change the law of fashion prevalent in their nation, they can direct the law of fashion toward just goals in their own communities.Laws change behavior. While they cannot make everyone do the right thing, if penalties are sufficiently stringent, and if they are actually enforced, good laws can at least make most people do the right thing most of the time. Without just laws justly applied a healthy society is impossible. But laws are not enough to ensure that justice prevails in a nation. There must also be widespread social pressure for people to do the right thing. Thomas West notes, in fact, in The Political Theory of the American Founding (quotes from chapter 11), that for the American founders, social pressure was seen to be even more important than good laws. James Madison called this social pressure the “law of fashion.” Indeed, “public opinion,” Madison maintained, “sets bounds to every government and is the real sovereign in every free one.” John Adams agreed and therefore insisted that
it is a principal end of government to regulate this passion, which in its turn becomes a principal means of government. It is the only adequate instrument of order and subordination in society, and alone commands effective obedience to laws, since without it neither human reason, nor standing armies, would ever produce that great effect.
The last week provides several clear illustrations of how central the “law of fashion” is in determining how things go in our country. First, there is the border crisis. In the past, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has not been particularly quick to act in preventing mass illegal crossings into his state. Time will tell if this is all a piece of political theatre, but it appears that Abbott is finally willing to take significant steps to close the border. This includes calling the mass influx of illegal crossing an invasion (thus invoking Article IV, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution) and defying the recent Supreme Court decision that the Border Patrol can begin cutting razor wire along the border. Abbott is not the kind of Governor to take risky actions. Unless, that is, he perceives that doing so will be widely popular. Abbott knows that most Americans are troubled by the massive numbers of illegal aliens coming into America and want Abbott to stand firm, but even more than that, he has likely been encouraged to continue standing up to the border malfeasance of the Federal government because of the extremely positive response his actions received among the Governors of 25 other states. These Governors signed letters showing they stand with Texas in support of the state’s constitutional right to defend its border regardless of Federal action or inaction. Some even pledged the use of their own states’ National Guard units. The U.S. Constitution clearly gives Abbott the right to secure Texas’ border, but it wasn’t until the “law of fashion” did its work that Abbott became willing to act. That is to say, a just law wasn’t enough; social pressure, more than anything else, is what pushed Abbott over the edge.
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Shepherding Children through Hardships and Trials
Whatever the situation, when our children are hard-pressed with troubles and trials, we can be on the lookout for ways to come alongside to bear their burden (Gal. 6:2). This, too, takes wisdom because every situation and child are different. There is no one-size-fits-all playbook here, so godly wisdom is needed to meet each child where he or she is. As we gauge the gravity of the trial and a particular child’s capacity to handle it, wisdom means tailoring our engagement to the situation.
Seeing our children suffer through trials can be extremely difficult. Even parents who are well-equipped to cope with their own problems often find themselves feeling helpless when their child is the one hurting. How can we shepherd our children through adversity in a healthy, God-honoring way? When troubles find our children, here are three ways we can support them.
Provide a Faithful Presence
As parents and caregivers, when we see our children suffering, our impulse is to jump immediately into action mode. Sometimes urgent intervention is the right and necessary thing to do. But it is also often the case that children who are facing trials need our faithful presence more than our problem-solving skills. We know from our own experience that in times of turmoil, sometimes we simply want to be comforted by the presence of a loved one—someone who will patiently sit with us rather than rush to fix us, someone with whom we feel safe. Our children yearn for that type of refuge as well, and one of the highest privileges of being a parent is that we get to reflect this aspect of God’s good character in our homes.
If parenting can be compared to shepherding, this part of our role is the one in which the shepherd comes to know his sheep so well that his mere presence is a comfort to the flock. Likewise, there is a way in which we can embody the peace of God while pointing our children to Him as our ultimate rock and refuge (Ps. 18:2). When crisis barges into our children’s lives, we have an opportunity to be there for them in a way that communicates a calming reassurance over their distress. Before we even lift a finger to help resolve the crisis at hand, our presence and demeanor can show our children that we are with them and for them and, even better, so is God. In times of need, we can remind our children that the Lord is near to all who call on Him (Ps. 145:18).
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Entrusting Our Children to God
While we have been given the responsibilities to tend, teach, and train, we cannot drag, push, or pull our kids screaming and kicking into the kingdom of God. There is no guarantee that we will see the results that we want, in the way that we want, or in the time that we want. No, “salvation belongs to the Lord” (Ps. 3:8; see also Rev. 7:10). It is only the Holy Spirit, working in His way and His time, who will call our children to faith.
My fourteen-year-old self had gone to bed at my usual 9 p.m. time. Two hours later, I woke up to use the bathroom. While walking undetected past my parents’ darkened room, I not only heard my dad whispering, but I heard him whispering my name. It was at that unforgettable moment that I learned that my parents’ bedtime routine included intercession on behalf of their three children.
I shouldn’t have been surprised. I had been blessed with parents whose only stated hope for me for as long as I can remember was that I would grow up to love, follow, and serve Jesus Christ. As Christian parents, we ought to hope the same for our children. Nothing more. Nothing less.
But challenges to passing on the faith in today’s world and seeing these good desires realized are many. Marketing, media, social media, and peer groups are among the many compelling voices that speak counter to the gospel, summoning the allegiance of our children and teens. Research from David Kinnaman and Mark Matlock in their book Faith for Exiles reveals that more and more of our kids who have grown up in the church and Christian homes are following “the course of this world” (Eph. 2:2) as only 10 percent of eighteen- to twenty-nine-year-olds who “grew up as Christians” are embracing a lifestyle of consistent discipleship.
The good news is that parents always exercise the greatest influence on the spiritual lives of their children. This should not be surprising, since God has established the home as the primary arena for spiritual nurture (Deut. 6; Eph. 6:1–4). This influence is effectively exercised as we entrust our children to God, which includes certain responsibilities that He has entrusted to us. How can we entrust our children to Him in a contemporary world full of distractions that so easily leads both children and parents away from the faithful pursuit of the chief end of glorifying God and enjoying Him forever?
First, to entrust your children to God is to tend to yourself. I love Tedd Tripp’s definition of parenting as “shepherding the hearts of your children in the ways of God’s wisdom.” It follows that the only way that we can effectively nurture our children in the ways of God’s wisdom is to be constantly nurturing ourselves.Read More
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